The 2000 election saw a tight race between incumbent vice president Al Gore and Republican party nominee George W. Bush for the presidency. The election was characterized by a battle between Gore and Bush for Florida, of which the result could decide the presidency. This was due to a new kind of ballot called the butterfly ballot used in the election, which made it confusing for voters to know who they were voting for. This means that some voters left the voting booth not knowing who they voted for, or even if they voted for the candidate they wanted to vote for. 

What made this election unique compared to the other historic contested elections is that there was modern news media involved who were trying to call the election in real time. Conflicted news reports created confusion as to who actually won, which is in addition to the confusion about what should be done about the ballots. This meant that the election was sent to the courts. The issue with this, is that Bush had seemingly won the vote by the ballots, however many believed that Al Gore would have actually won the popular vote if you considered the amount of people who intended to vote for Gore and were unable to due to the election system. 

The instability caused by this crisis rattled the legitimacy of the election. Many media outlets called for the candidates to respond, including the Washington Post in an article titled “A Time to Act Presidential” which called for both candidates to endorse a full recount of Florida. This call for action is very interesting as it reflects how this crisis of legitimacy didn’t just affect who won, but it affected how the winner would be perceived as a president based on how they acted during the crisis. Applying this idea to a more recent election, Trump’s refusal to accept the results in 2020 was a huge hit to this credibility. Only time will tell how much this hit to his credibility will really matter when it comes to the 2024 election.